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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23707930">Cold Calculus</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/closetcellist/pseuds/closetcellist'>closetcellist</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Leading the Hunt [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Magnus Archives (Podcast)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>A boy and his dog, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, The Hunt, lesbian angst, through ep 160</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 20:21:29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,086</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23707930</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/closetcellist/pseuds/closetcellist</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Basira misses Daisy. But she's keeping her around anyways.</p><p>An exploration of how Basira handles Daisy's surrender to the Hunt and the world post- Watcher's Crown.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Basira Hussain/Alice "Daisy" Tonner</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Leading the Hunt [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1707244</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>27</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>When Basira reached the scene (she couldn’t think of it any other way), what she saw was this:</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Unidentified older male, likely one Trevor Herbert, on the ground, left arm at an angle that screamed broken, with a face that was a bloody pulpy mess, unmoving, presumed dead. Unidentified female, likely Julia Montauk, on the ground gasping her last breaths through the ragged hole where her throat used to be as she bled out. Daisy Tonner, still standing, though it seemed barely given the way she swayed and the clear bullet holes in her chest and shoulder. The blood around her mouth and on her bared teeth was unfortunate, as was the fact that when Basira swept her flashlight over her partner, her eyes reflected the light in a distinctly animal fashion.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t move!” Basira snapped, pointing her pistol at Daisy, taking a slow breath to steady her shot. They had talked about this. Talked through all the possibilities. She had promised Daisy that if this happened—once this happened—her return to the Hunt, she would put her down.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She expected Daisy to rush her, but she just stood, breathing heavily, staring with eyes that didn’t look right, bleeding less than she should.</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>“Daisy?” Basira asked, though she didn’t yet lower the gun.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Daisy cocked her head to the side, as though thinking, but said nothing, and still did not move.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She had the thoughts without really processing them, filtering through the possibilities and options and coming to her own quiet conclusion. She inched toward Daisy, her gun and flashlight still pointed at her, and Daisy just waited, calm and still and obedient. When she was within reach, she paused, just to see if Daisy would swipe at her, but still, she didn’t move. Finally, Basira struck, clocking Daisy on the temple with the butt of her gun, dropping her to the ground.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Basira watched Daisy pace. When she was young, her school had taken a field trip to the London Zoo and she had seen an old tiger pacing its cage like that, frustrated, under-stimulated, slowly driving itself to despair. Though Daisy had always reminded Basira of a wolf more than a tiger.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It had been a week since the attack. A week in which she had kept watch over Daisy within one of the Archive’s storage rooms. She had not bandaged her wounds, nor given her any food, and yet the wounds had healed and Daisy did not look any leaner than she already had. She hadn’t spoken, and after the first night hadn’t tried to escape. Basira was fairly certain she also had not slept, but that was difficult to prove. Daisy, according to all of the evidence she had collected, was no longer human. And Basira had promised her that she would not let her live as a pawn of the Hunt. She had given her word.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Except…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Daisy!” she called through the door, and Daisy came to a halt in her endless circle, her strange gaze locking on Basira’s. She still responded to her name. That meant something. It had to mean something.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But how far did that recognition go?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira had a chance to test her theories when Georgie came to check on them (or the Archives, it was hard to say for certain which) a few days later. Basira had let Daisy out of the storage room but not out of the Archives, which had been serving as her base of operations since the attacks and failure of Peter Lukas’ plans and the departure of Jon, Martin, and most of the other staff. Daisy hadn’t changed her behavior much in those few days, simply pacing, pacing, and occasionally waiting, staring at Basira whenever she moved, but not coming within more than a few feet of her at any point. Basira had nearly stopped reaching for her gun when she heard Daisy’s light tread on the carpet now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Things changed that morning, when, despite Basira settled quietly and comfortably nearby, researching, Daisy suddenly stopped her near ceaseless pacing to stare at the door to the Archives. Frowning, Basira followed her gaze, but there didn’t seem to be anything different, until she finally heard what Daisy apparently already had—footsteps, walking purposely down the hallway. Then a hand on the knob, a rattle, a humorless but familiar laugh as Georgie on the other side realized it was locked, and the sound of the key, sliding in, turning, the door opening.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Within seconds, Basira was on her feet, her gun in her hand, tracking Daisy as she sprinted full pelt at the door. It seemed to open in slow motion as Georgie stepped through, her expression almost comically surprised when she turned to see Daisy barrelling toward her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Heel!” Basira snapped before she could think about the words, what she was doing, and why she hadn’t pulled the trigger.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And it worked—Daisy froze, inches from Georgie, snapping her teeth together next to her ear and growling low in her throat, though she didn’t move any closer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>After a breath, Georgie took a step back, closed the door, and looked Daisy over. “So she’s really gone then,” she said, not quite casual. But no, that was right, Georgie wasn’t afraid of anything. The hesitation was pity, perhaps, or maybe genuine regret and sorrow. Basira didn’t know her well enough to be certain.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But she listens,” Basira said, feeling more confident about that theory now. “Come back here, Daisy.”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>Daisy looked at Georgie, eyes locked with hers to stare her down even as she stalked back over to Basira’s side, stopping with a quiet huff a foot away.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Now, stay,” Basira said, letting the momentary feeling of ridiculousness and guilt pass through her unacknowledged as she said it. Daisy became as still as she ever was, quiet, coiled but controlled menace, her attention still on Georgie.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Georgie observed them with a small frown. “Is that a good idea? I thought you had...an arrangement.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We did,” Basira said. “But she’s too useful. We can’t afford to waste resources, not when we don’t know what’s coming next.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Georgie turned her full attention to Basira then, when Daisy failed to charge her again. “Is that what you really think?” she asked quietly. “She was your friend. Your partner. That’s awfully cold to talk about her like a tool.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira’s mouth thinned. “That’s what I think. Besides, if she’s really gone, this can’t hurt her at all, can it. She isn’t here to be hurt.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Georgie’s expression softened a little, and she hummed noncommittally at that. “I suppose that’s true. And it’s far from the worst thing any of us has done.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“She asked me to do it so she wouldn’t hurt anyone. Anyone who was...a person. Who didn’t deserve to be hurt,” Basira said, voicing the justifications she had gone through already herself, every day. “I’m still going to make sure that doesn’t happen.”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>“I’m not judging you,” Georgie said, raising her hands. “Things are...well, you know what they are. You’re probably right to keep her around. Anyways, I wanted to check up on you, see if you were still here. See what was going on, if you needed anything…” she trailed off without making it a real question, but was clearly waiting for an answer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We’re fine,” Basira said. “I’ve got things under control.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I shouldn’t have expected anything less,” Georgie said. “And do you know what happened with Elias?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira shook her head. “By the time I got to the place, he was gone. Martin explained what happened, and I haven’t seen him. Either of them--both of them. Magnus or Elias. Whatever we should call them. It. I wish I could say I was sure they were dead, but I doubt any of us are that lucky.”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>“I didn’t think we would be,” Georgie said. “Are you planning to stay here, still?”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>“There’s too much shit in here to risk letting it go unguarded,” Basira said. “Besides, this is where my arsenal is.” She smiled thinly, without amusement. It wasn’t a joke.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fair enough. Martin tells me Jon’s doing...well, he’s doing well for Jon. Subsisting, laying low. Nothing too spooky to report yet. I’ll pop by again to see how you’re getting on, if you don’t mind. See if anything’s changed, keep you updated and all that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Thanks,” Basira said. She meant it, but she wondered if she should say more. After almost two weeks with only Daisy and the Archives, it seemed a bit more difficult than it should have to remember proper social niceties. “I appreciate it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Georgie grinned at that, or something in her expression. “I know. We’re all fucked up, don’t worry about it. See you soon.” She waved over her shoulder, slipping out of the door and making sure it pulled closed and locked behind her as she left.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Once the door clicked shut, Daisy let out a quiet whine, and Basira remembered her, turning to see her standing still, exactly as she had been since the moment Basira ordered her. That was interesting.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“All right, go on,” Basira said. “The door’s locked. You can get back to...whatever you’ve been doing.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At that, Daisy relaxed, for a second, and then jogged over to the door to the Archives. She didn’t try to open it, but stood, staring out the window, presumably until Georgie was out of sight and hearing, and then resumed her pacing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira sighed, rubbing the bridge of her nose. She was already thinking of things she should have asked Georgie, but she hadn’t been prepared. She would be next time. Grabbing a notepad from one of the desks, she quickly jotted a few things down, making a list of things to ask when Georgie returned, assuming she had the chance.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>*****</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Something had gone very wrong.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When Daisy started to howl, a noise her throat was not truly made for, Basira thought perhaps it was another attack--another Hunter, Elias, someone after something in the Archives--but as she sprang from the cot, a gun already in her hand, she could feel that it wasn’t.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The ground was shaking, but that was the least of the problems, as the air seemed to become too hot, too cold, oxygenless and unbreathable all at once. The lights in the Archives burst in a shower of sparks, sinking the entire place into oppressive darkness and for a moment, she thought she was falling, had fallen, had died.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The screaming began outside, and Daisy roared, the sound reverberating through the dark, and flung herself at the door out of the Archives, once, twice, again, until it splintered off its hinges. Basira heard her footsteps as she sprinted down the hall.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>After that, things got bad.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Lately, Basira had been keeping two guns and a knife on her at all times, and had amassed quite an armory in the Archives, but all of that careful stockpiling was useless when she didn’t know where her bullets were after the lights and the sense went out. She didn’t even know </span>
  <em>
    <span>if</span>
  </em>
  <span> they were now, and so she abandoned her hard won preparations and struggled for a door instead, the jagged hole left by Daisy’s escape.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She had stayed in the Archives to protect it, or to protect herself from others who would want to use what it held. To stop those who wanted an apocalypse to happen from getting their hands on something within Artifact Storage that would help them tear apart the world. But that didn’t really seem necessary anymore.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She felt as though she were wading through thick mud sucking her down into somewhere even darker than the Archives, though the room had been clean and clear a moment before. As her eyes adjusted to the new reality, the darkness became dim and grey in the distance, shapes appearing out of the stifling blackness. A desk? A man? A chair? A trap?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira struggled silently forward, her thoughts shrinking to a singular focus as they had during the Unknowing. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I am me. I am here. Here is bad, so I will move until I am in another place.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The closer she got to the shattered remains of the door, the less the darkness sucked at her, and though she could not trust the shapes she saw, she could move with more confidence along the floor—carpet now, over concrete, she had always suspected, though perhaps she could not rely on the knowledge of the past any longer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Between her and the door was a figure. She froze, watching it, a shadow outlined fuzzy grey in the slivers of light that reached them. Man-like in shape. But it did not move. Was it breathing? Impossible to say. Unclear if it mattered on the threat it posed. But it had not been there before. Had it?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She waited a second, a minute, but it still didn’t move, so instead she did, inching forward and sideways, a gun out and keeping it aimed at the figure. She never expected the attack to come from the ground.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A hand grabbed her ankle, hard plastic or wood or not flesh but bone, clutching at her and dragging her down. Basira fell with a sharp shout, dropping her gun and kicking back at what grabbed her, her boot colliding with something too hard, sending a shock of pain up her leg, but she kicked again and again, until she could twist her leg out of its grasp.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The shadow was gone from the barely lit door frame when she scrambled to her feet and ran.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Basira stumbled out of the Magnus Institute and into the street, though why she had bothered was abruptly unclear when she looked up and saw the Eye. The infinitude of space had never worried her, possibly because in London it was impossible to see more than a few stars with all of the light pollution, but the entire sky replaced by an impossible eye, staring and staring and somehow, despite the size, always staring at </span>
  <em>
    <span>you</span>
  </em>
  <span>—that was too much. Nearly enough to make her turn and run back into the contained danger of the darkness and strangeness of the Archives.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She shook her head, closing her eyes tightly and forcing herself to look down when she finally opened them again. Forcing herself to breathe, slowly and deliberately. She had gotten out of the Unknowing by having a goal. She had gotten out of the Archives by having a goal. What was her goal now?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Daisy!” Basira called, looking up again and unholstering her second, now only gun. She swept the area, noting obvious dangers and less obvious possibilities to be dealt with if they occurred. There was still screaming, the noise of accidents and fights, so it would be difficult to gauge how far her voice might carry now. But she had to find Daisy—she had made a promise, and she couldn’t keep that promise if she didn’t know where Daisy, or her body, was.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She scanned the area, looking and listening for something that would give her a clue, but the world was all wrong and she didn’t know yet what would constitute something off. So she took the easiest path forward, working first from the assumption that Daisy wasn’t trying to hide, but to hunt, and there seemed no reason for her to do it stealthily now. She walked quickly, keeping cover at her back as much as possible, and followed the nearest screams.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sweeping her gun around a corner, she saw a man on fire. Still alive, his skin crackling and splitting, his fat melting from him as he screamed and staggered, unable to see where he was going through the smoke and heat of himself. Basira dispatched him with one shot.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She stopped wasting her bullets on mercy very quickly.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She felt the fear in her chest, a hot ball of panic trying to spread and burst out of her, to take hold of her lungs and make them shudder. To take hold of her mind and make it wrong. To take hold of her spirit and make it quaver. But she pushed forward, even when forward meant having to dive backward out of the trajectory of the workmen stepping off of the top of a five story building that had been under construction when the world changed. They seemed to flicker as they fell, like images in a zoetrope, though they hit the ground barely feet from where Basira had been with the same speed as would have been expected in a world with proper physics, and their bodies broke in the same way.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When she felt the panic rising, she yelled again, shouting Daisy’s name to center herself and remember her purpose.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wound through residential streets as quickly as she could manage. They didn’t seem like a hunting ground, not properly. She saw heavy blackness in the alleyways and through some windows and doors, featureless and unsettling faces peering out of others. There were fires, but those were easier to avoid, as the smoke could be seen further away and provided more warning than many of the other horrors.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira nearly shot herself in the foot when a tidal wave of rats oozed from a sewer grate, so many the mass moved like liquid tar and flowed around her, over her feet, nearly up to her knees. She managed to stay upright, barely, certain deep within herself that if she fell, she would be devoured. Even standing, she felt their teeth against her boots, against her trousers, her legs and ankles as she forced herself to wade forward. The rats did not follow—they did not care for an individual target, not when they had the whole city waiting for them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She managed to reach the bank of the Thames, resolutely not looking into the water, certain that there was nothing there that would do anything but hurt her focus. There were more people around now, and she had to dodge through frantic cars who themselves were dodging smoking wrecks. Across the river, she could see trees, green—Battersea Park. With a certainty that felt like a cooling balm over her frantic heartbeat, Basira was sure that Daisy had made her way there. It was hard to run, to chase, between houses and cars and people; much easier to do so in the grass and likely easier to find targets as well.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The bridge was difficult to navigate. Standing on one side of the river, it looked the same as ever, and she was buffeted by a few other people trying to flee across it to whatever imagined safety waited for them on the other side. But once on the bridge—</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Every step was uncertainty. She knew there was water under the bridge. And she knew there was not. She knew there were guardrails, and she knew there was nothing to stop her from plummeting into the yawning, gaping abyss that waited below the concrete. The rope. The wood. The stepping stones in a small stream. The single I-beam a hundred feet up from the unforgiving ground. Basira looked back, and the side she had started from was only a foot behind her. She didn’t know how long she had been walking.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Closing her eyes tightly, Basira took a few quick breaths and sprinted.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She didn’t open her eyes again until she bowled into someone, knocking them both sprawling, but as the asphalt scraped her hand and bruised her shoulder, the familiarity was a relief. With a wide-eyed glance around, she saw she was on the other side, and she didn’t stop to apologize to the person she had knocked into because they had made no sound and she would not look at them to see if they were human or alive.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pushing through into the park, things felt different once again, and the certainty came back. The trees should have been neatly lining walking paths, but once she stepped onto the grass, the air became oppressive, the trees taller, darker, a forest, a jungle, a place to hunt.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Daisy!” Basira shouted again, and her voice was hoarse and scratchy. Had she been screaming? She didn’t know, pressing into the park, into the land of the hunt, deeper and deeper, calling her partner’s name.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But finally, a response. There was a low, quiet noise from somewhere nearby, though Basira could see no one and nothing. Nothing until a bush nearby rustled, just a little, as something slipped through it. “Daisy. I know that’s you,” Basira said, banking on Daisy still knowing her. Banking on it being Daisy at all. Banking on too many things. “Come out of there.”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>Her gun in her hand, with only half its bullets, pointed at the bush.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>What emerged from the bush was a man, grinning, eyes wild and hungry, a kitchen knife and a pair of scissors clutched in his hands. He leapt forward, and Basira pulled the trigger, hitting his shoulder but not slowing him down as the pain didn’t seem to register or matter to him. He crashed into her, knocking her over, the knife burying itself in the soil beside her head with the disconcerting sound of metal sliding into dirt, the scissors raised in his other hand.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A howling blur knocked him off her, tumbling him across the ground until Daisy was on top of him, swinging her arm to claw his throat open. The arterial spray that hit the tree and ground around them said she had managed it. Daisy turned her head to the sky, the enormous terrible eye that stared down at them, and howled her pure delight.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Daisy turned then, to look at Basira who had just gotten to her knees. She was...she was Daisy. She seemed toothier, somehow. Sharper. Everything about her was primed, coiled energy waiting to strike. And now, bloodied and wild, she looked at Basira and watched her as she picked up her gun.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You can’t run away like that again,” she said, gruffly, and Daisy had the gall to laugh. At least, she thought it was a laugh.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We’re getting out of here,” Basira said, holstering her gun, and Daisy stood, circling her once with a quiet huff, and slipping into the trees nearby, quiet and careful.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They began the long walk out of London.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>It had taken...it was impossible to say how long it had taken for them to get out of London. “Days” were a concept that no longer mattered or meant anything worth remembering anymore. It had taken a lot of effort to cross the expanse of London, and Basira was certain she wouldn’t have made it without Daisy, though trying to control her on the way had been a struggle of its own. More than once, Daisy had tried to take off after someone Basira was certain (as certain as anyone could be) was just a person, like her, struggling through their own fear. Out of frustration, Basira had broken off a bike chain and fashioned a collar out of it for Daisy, who had grumbled but submitted to the situation without retribution. She had promised Daisy she wouldn’t let her hurt anyone who didn’t deserve it, and she was going to keep that promise, whatever that meant now and however it had to be managed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Early on, Basira had tried her mobile, just to see what would happen. She’d dialled Georgie and though the ringing was ragged and the connection nearly all static, she’d shouted through it just the same, telling her they were alive, hoping she and Melanie were too. She’d told them they were leaving London and what direction they were going to try to head, though directions might also be as meaningless as time. She’d hung up then, not willing to divulge anything else. The eye was always watching them, and perhaps it always already knew what they were going to try. But there was no sense in making things easy for it.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Basira had slept, sometimes, but she couldn’t tell if it was necessary, nor if sleeping actually helped. When she did sleep, it was surface level, restless and easily disturbed. A bone deep tiredness that Daisy didn’t seem to feel settled into her, slowing her walk and reactions. Sometimes they found food, unexpired and untainted, and that was a pleasant few minutes where she could do something normal—it wasn’t the food, she knew that. If they needed to eat, they would have both starved by now. But taking a moment to sit and eat as though she needed to, making the decision to devote her time to something so fundamental, so natural, so human, replenished her flagging spirits even if it did nothing for her body.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Daisy kept watch when she slept, in abandoned houses and cars, avoiding dark places, tight places, and people as much as they could. Once, she woke to find Daisy covered in blood and looking far too satisfied with herself. She couldn’t know for certain who she had killed, nor how many, only that she certainly had killed someone. It was hard to place the rage that surged in her then, anger that later she knew was at herself, at failing Daisy and not thinking things through, not planning well enough, not taking enough variables into account. But that was later, and when she woke to see Daisy as she should not have been, she only felt the rage and let it course through her, directing her hand as she struck Daisy hard enough across the face to snap her head to the side.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira came back to herself in a moment of cold shock, the two of them freezing for a moment in a tableau of anger and fear. She wondered if that would be the end, if the tenuous hold she had on Daisy had snapped, if the next thing she saw would be her teeth. If she would have to finally try to put her down. But Daisy just huffed quietly, averting her gaze, and when they began to move again she slunk behind Basira at the end of her chain.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The world continued to change and warp after the initial shattering of reality. Basira had tried to steer Daisy away from people as much as she could, but the longer things progressed the fewer people they saw. At first, Basira took this as a sign that they were making good progress away from London’s center, which would have explained it. She didn’t expect most people to leave their homes—either because it would be safer inside or because they were already dealing with fears of their own and couldn’t escape them—and the fairly easy way they slipped through rows of houses and streets of row houses was encouraging to her, at first.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It seemed unlikely that anything like good luck would continue, but it wasn’t until she stumbled into the first nightmare that Basira understood it hadn’t been luck, simply confident obliviousness, a lack of knowledge that led to a blind and misplaced optimism.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There had been a growing part of Basira that was beginning to think of Daisy as a dog, or some other kind of animal, well-trained but different, not quite completely there and certainly not human. Not on the same level as her anymore. But whatever Daisy might be, however much of her might still be there or not, she was certainly smart enough to see what Basira missed. Time didn’t mean anything in the world but it meant less, or somehow more, in the Darkness she slipped into. She hadn’t noticed it, the severe edges of what she’d taken for a natural shadow, too distracted or too tired to process it. Likely that was what the world wanted.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Later she couldn’t say whether she had misstepped into the dark or if it had shifted, reaching out to grab her. It didn’t matter; the effect was the same. One step in the world and the next it was as though she had gone blind, deaf, separated entirely from existence, aware of herself and only herself, no longer feeling the ground that should be beneath her but without the telltale drop in her stomach of falling. Simply nothing, but without any landmark to indicate space. She tried to feel around, but while she believed she was moving her arms they touched nothing, and with no ground to move against, she could not walk. She was herself, but she was not in a place, and so she could not leave it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira thought about screaming. She thought about moving her hands to touch her face, her sides. To feel the fabric of her shirt. To create some sensation to ground herself besides the oppressive darkness. But a fear gripped her heart so tightly that she could not move, could not scream. If she screamed and did not hear it, if she tried to touch herself but did not feel anything, then was she even herself? Did she exist? Had she had a life at all?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She was going to hyperventilate, with or without lungs to do it, with or without air to breathe, when she heard something. It started quiet, and at first she thought she was imagining it—she was well enough aware that sensory deprivation could cause hallucinations of all types—but it grew louder, as though approaching from a distance. Distance, that was something she could measure even if only in her mind. Distance existed, because something was coming from it. She </span>
  <em>
    <span>was</span>
  </em>
  <span> in a place, even if she was trapped there. It did exist and so did she.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The sound grew into a growl, low and resonant, the sound of the first animal to hunt man, approaching through the ancient dark of the deepest caves and densest forests. But that sound brought life back to her, and Basira knew it was Daisy. Her Daisy, even powered as she was by the tooth that rent the flesh of the first man</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She couldn’t see her approach, but she felt it when Daisy collided with her, her growl a loud and all-encompassing reverberation and her breath hot on Basira’s face. Basira thought she fell, and felt Daisy’s weight on top of her and she knew she had a body again. She felt Daisy shift and grab her, with hands and arms rather than teeth, as she momentarily suspected might happen, and she thought she might be being dragged, but without anything to create friction or space, it was hard to say for certain. All she knew was that she had nearly become nothing in the dark and all at once there was light again. Light and ground and space, and Daisy, her arms wrapped tight around Basira’s chest, tugging her backward, away from a pool of shadow that she avoided looking at too long, though in the glance she dared give it, looked strangely ragged around the edges.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Daisy—” Basira said, too quiet, and then repeated too loud, “Daisy,” and Daisy stopped, propped her upright and let go, taking a step back and waiting, patient and deferent.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira turned around and, all at once, for the first time since the world had broken and some time before that, burst into tears. She sank to her knees, covering her face as she tried to gather some shreds of composure, but she lost it again when Daisy crouched in front of her and whined, so like a worried puppy that it started her tears all over again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When she could finally speak, she looked up, reached out and cupped Daisy’s face in her hands. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, the words heavy and wet. “I’m so sorry.” She pressed a gentle kiss to Daisy’s forehead before taking a breath and undoing the makeshift leash that wrapped around Daisy’s neck. The skin there was red, and Basira touched it lightly, guiltily, but Daisy made no indication that it bothered her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When she could look at her face again, Basira continued. “I’m sorry, about everything. I don’t—I don’t know what this world is for you. But you know what it is for me. And you didn’t have to do that, but you did. You saved me. Again. I don’t know how many times you’ve saved me. And I haven’t...I haven’t been good to you. Not for a long time.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Daisy huffed, and leaned forward, butting her forehead lightly against Basira’s and gently nuzzling her cheek. Basira embraced her then, wrapping her arms around her tightly, and after a long moment of no expectations, Daisy embraced her back</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There was no definite edge to London, but at some point in walking, things began to feel lighter. Not better, exactly, but just a little less thick and a little less dense with the fear stinking up the world.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I think we’re out of the city now,” Basira said, glancing at Daisy who walked beside her. “Or...I don’t know if you can call it a city anymore. But I think we’ve passed the border of something.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Daisy didn’t reply—she rarely did—but she didn’t disagree either.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We need a new goal then,” Basira said, definitely. “We’re not walking away anymore, so we have to be walking to something. Or looking for something.” A stray, wistful thought drifted by, probably better to ignore, but then again, why not? “We should look for a house. One that isn’t...already claimed by something. Infected. You know what I mean.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At this, Daisy grunted an agreement, and Basira smiled. It was good to have everyone on board with a plan.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She deferred to Daisy now when they approached the structures they passed on their trek through the wilderness. Basira could tell well enough if there were people around, but people weren’t their biggest concern any longer. Daisy could sense, through sight, smell, or something else, when a place had already been Claimed. It didn’t matter who or what it was claimed by—they were all equivalently dangerous and Daisy wouldn’t let her near them anyways.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Basira kept count, not on purpose, but out of habit or for something else to occupy her mind with, and it was only after passing two hundred and eleven other possibilities that they found something with potential. It could kindly be described as a shack, and there was little surrounding it but junk—a long-broken-down truck, tires for a different vehicle, scrap metal and a wood pile that had collapsed on itself and begun the long process of disintegration. But there was no one around and Daisy seemed to think it was safe enough.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The inside, after they’d forced the door open and likely broken the latch, was dusty and dirty, but there was a table and a broken chair that could probably be fixed. There was a kitchen, previously raided and left an empty mess, but it was there. There was a bedroom, with a dingy, thin mattress stripped bare of sheets. But the room had a door and Basira had been sleeping on the ground most times that she tried sleeping at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was empty, and it was dirty, and it was barely a house.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Welcome home,” Basira said, wryly, before she reached out to ruffle Daisy’s hair.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Basira grunted in her sleep, surfacing from a strangling dream of crushing and frowned as she tried to roll over but was trapped by the weight on top of her. “Get off,” she grumbled. “That’s not cute.”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>Daisy didn’t move except to get more comfortable as she sprawled over Basira’s stomach. For someone that expressly didn’t need or want to sleep, she seemed to be enjoying herself far too much. “I know you’re doing this on purpose. Why are you doing this.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Daisy just snuffled, but Basira was convinced there was amusement in it. Perhaps the sound had even been a laugh.</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>“You’re impossible,” Basira complained, but she didn’t push Daisy away, just lay back and thought about the two of them. They were not safe. Basira strongly suspected there was no such thing as safety any longer; not in this world. But they were not under attack at the moment. They were safe </span>
  <em>
    <span>enough</span>
  </em>
  <span> that Daisy felt she could take a break from her vigilance and lie down. Basira felt safe enough to let her. And that was something. If Daisy really was here, Basira hoped that she thought it was something too.</span>
  <br/>
</p>
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